little children

in one of my classes we have been spending time talking about how freud relates to fairy tales, which is aparently in numerous ways. we first, however, had to discuss the pillars of freudian psychoanalysis, inclding the oedipus complex. basically, it is when a child harbors a hatred towards their parent of their sex to get closer to their parent of the opposite sex, much like oedipus the king (kills his father, marrys his mother.) you get the picture. anyways, the professor of this particular class had no qualms about sharing with the class various examples from his own son's childhood which "cleary demonstrated" how "nicholas" harbored a deep-seeded desire to destroy his father, my professor.

....what?

he compared his child's emotional burden to the fairy tale of the three little pigs. normally, children are supposed to identify with this story and learn from the piggy who built his house out of bricks that hard work pays off. however, some "emotionally disturbed" children identify with the villan, the wolf. my professor's son identified with the wolf, and aparently wanted to appropriate all destructive and evil powers of the wolf in order to over take the wolf, who, in the child's mind, was represented by his father (my professor.) in short, my professor's son had an oedipus complex and wanted to kill his father.

i'm just really not sure i buy all that. i really do not think that children have the knowledge and capacity for learning to properly comprehend the concept of death/killing/hatred. i believe that little boys might identify with the wolf in that story because he's powerful (like a superhero or firefighter is powerful.) and i also do not agree with the notion that every single child that has ever been born or ever will be born on this planet had/has/will have an oedipus complex.




this is the same class in which we discussed how the act of breastfeeding is a way for an infant to experience sexual pleasure.



....


i'm a little disturbed.


on a lighter note, i got another mysterious magazine subsciption in the mail, this time to cosmo, which i nor anyone i know is paying for. sweet.